Suzy Hansen a US freelance writer living in Turkey for five years speaks of an Istanbul Art-Boom Bubble in an article she published. In the article Hansen states “It appears that Istanbul, which went from a cosmopolitan wonderland in the 19th century to… a “pale, poor, second-class imitation of a Western city” for much of the 20th, is having its moment of rebirth… it is a heady time to be young and talented in Istanbul… In this conservative Muslim country of 80 million, the artists have minimal influence on social and political life at home… They have grown up during a relatively free and prosperous time in Turkey and make up an artistic elite that has more in common with their counterparts in other nations than with their own countrymen… the ruling Islamic conservative Justice and Development Party (A.K.P.), which routinely throws writers and journalists in jail, rarely bothers with provocative artists, at least so far… Freedom of expression is bad for politics, but contemporary art is good for business. Whether the government’s heavy-handed relationships with the corporate patrons of the art world will be good for art is another story.”

 

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